by Aditi Ramaswamy

At 13, I didn’t learn swimming: bobbed in the shallow end, arms and legs a nest of thrashing snakes, got a passing grade for effort.

At 18, I didn’t learn driving: kept almost swerving into the curb in an empty parking lot, mother shrieking next to me. I can’t tell how far away it is, I complained. My permit expired.

At 21, I didn’t learn hula: tried to make my limbs sway gracefully but kept wheeling off toward the wall, eyes blurry with frustrated tears. My future best friend found me afterward. “Dyspraxia,” she said. “It’s okay.”

The world coordinated.

Aditi Ramaswamy is an autistic software developer, author, aspiring heir to Loki, and avid consumer of both literature and baklava. As a teenager they devoured every Neil Gaiman book they could lay their hands on; thus began their deep love of irreverent creepy fantasy, which has never since died out. Find their history and social justice blog at: aditi-ramaswamy.medium.com.